CORAL ISLANDS. 893 



the land, as it retired, are remarkable for their uncommon 

 magnitude. The whole shores of Coupang are formed of 

 them, and the low hills in its vicinity are enveloped in 

 them ; but a few hundred yards from the town, they dis- 

 appear, when distinct strata of slate make their appear- 

 ance. The corals form a bed over the subjacent rocks 

 from 25 to 80 feet thick. 



Every thing announces that, in the Island of Timor, 

 there exist no mountains exclusively formed of corals. 

 As in all extensive countries, they are composed of vari- 

 ous substances. Quoy and Gaimard having coasted it 

 for about fifty leagues, sufficiently near to enable them to 

 form an idea of its geography, were able to see that it ex- 

 hibited volcanic appearances in several parts. Besides it 

 abounds in mines of gold and copper, which, in conjunc- 

 tion with what we have already mentioned, shews in a 

 general way the nature of the rocks of which it is com- 

 posed. 



Perhaps, remarks Quoy and Gaimard, the Bald-Head, 

 a mountain of King George's harbour in New Holland, 

 which Vancouver has described in passing, and on the sum- 

 mit of which he saw perfectly preserved branches of coral, 

 might be adduced as a fact in opposition to the opinion 

 here advanced. Yet the phenomenon exhibited there, is 

 still precisely the same as at Timor, and in a thousand 

 other places *. The zoophytes have built upon a basis 

 previously existing, and they occupy only the surface of 



* A remarkable fact of this kind is related by Salt, in his second 

 journey to Abyssinia. The Bay of Amphila, in the Red Sea, is formed, 

 he says, of twelve islands, eleven of which are in part composed of al- 

 luvial matters, consisting of corallines, madrepores, echinites, and a 

 great variety of shells common in that sea. The height of these islands 

 is sometimes thirty feet above high water. The small island, which dif- 



